Just picked up Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. Looks to be another page turner like his other novels, which is annoying because I'll probably finish it by Saturday. Also decided to give the Bourne series a try, so I got the first one. Chances are I'll become addicted, pound through however many of them there are by now in short order, and end up staring at yet another website for a year while I wait for the next sequel. It looks like the (hopefully) final installment of the Wheel of Time will be coming out in January, after they jerked me around for three years while dragging the supposedly last book out into three books. And I've been waiting for the next bloody Fire and Ice book for how long?

When will I stop with these damn never-ending (n+1)ologies? In the bookstore I saw four linked books by my old favorite, Larry Niven, the Fleet of Worlds series about the puppeteer migration. It was not easy to resist buying them, too.

"Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens."("Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.")-- Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805)Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.-- Philip K DickOK, now let's look at four dimensions on the blackboard.-- Dr. JoyEnglish isn't much of a language for swearing. When I studied Ancient Greek I was delighted to discover a single word - Rhaphanidosthai - which translates roughly as "Be thou thrust up the fundament with a radish for adultery."

I was so excited when I first heard the title of that book. I thought it was a dramatized story about the ratio between the circumference and the diameter of a circle, but alas, I was disapointed.

Disclaimer: Anything I say on topics of Politics, Economics, Pychology, History, really anything not concerned with the natural sciences and mathematics and especially topics concerning human behavior and/or thoughts, that is not associated with a proper reference is pure speculation on my part.

I'm big into Audible now, since I can "read" while i bike to work and back. I wish i was more prompt because I got this: http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B007EZKICY yesterday for $3.95 but I guess that sale is over. So far it's informative if a bit dry, please do not let that awful comic-book looking cover fool you, he's a bright guy, and the book has a forward by Dawkins.

gronank wrote:I was so excited when I first heard the title of that book. I thought it was a dramatized story about the ratio between the circumference and the diameter of a circle, but alas, I was disapointed.

I thought it was too...now you've ruined it for me!!!!

The smoke wafted gently in the breeze across the poop deck and all seemed right in the world.

Still stuck on p.61 of Casual some thing or other by JK Rawlings - sob.

Grand Deducer Watson of Sherlock. NoName, no pack drill. Astral zone changed five times a day (flexible). Great at manifesting parking spaces by thought control. Hatred of terminology of survivors and commitment to win-win reality.

"I don't mean to sound bitter, cynical or cruel; but I am, so that's how it comes out." ~ Bill Hicks."To argue with a person who has renounced reason is like administering medicine to the dead." ~ Thomas Paine."One should not believe everything one reads on the internet." ~ Abraham Lincoln."If you're making a political point wearing a balaclava, you're a c***. It was true for the IRA and it's true now." ~ daftbeaker.

Reached p.150 of the JK Rawlings book........... still no idea what it's about.

Grand Deducer Watson of Sherlock. NoName, no pack drill. Astral zone changed five times a day (flexible). Great at manifesting parking spaces by thought control. Hatred of terminology of survivors and commitment to win-win reality.

Meh. Moderately entertaining, but contrived and predictable. Not nearly as disappointing as the Clive Cussler book I tried to read a while back, but not nearly as good as I expected. Editing is a lost art, and who knows what kind of knuckleheads (if any) read these things before they get sent to the publisher.

"Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens."("Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.")-- Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805)Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.-- Philip K DickOK, now let's look at four dimensions on the blackboard.-- Dr. JoyEnglish isn't much of a language for swearing. When I studied Ancient Greek I was delighted to discover a single word - Rhaphanidosthai - which translates roughly as "Be thou thrust up the fundament with a radish for adultery."

I reckon the author nicked some ideas from 'William Hope Hodgson' who wrote some very early Sci Fi/Horror stuff. In 'The Derelict', a short story which I recommend, Hodgson wrote of a carnivorous ship wreck, whilst in 'Life of Pi' there is a carnivorous island.

The smoke wafted gently in the breeze across the poop deck and all seemed right in the world.

Rainswept wrote: There are 3 in the top 15 that i have not read. Brave New world, American Gods, and Nueromancer. I'm leaning towards American Gods.

If you haven't read Neuromancer, you should. Look at the publication date. Then retro-fit the story onto all the sci-fi you've read that was written since then. Quite a few of what you thought were original ideas are actually ripped off from this book. At least, that's what I thought when I read it about 4 years ago.

"I don't mean to sound bitter, cynical or cruel; but I am, so that's how it comes out." ~ Bill Hicks."To argue with a person who has renounced reason is like administering medicine to the dead." ~ Thomas Paine."One should not believe everything one reads on the internet." ~ Abraham Lincoln."If you're making a political point wearing a balaclava, you're a c***. It was true for the IRA and it's true now." ~ daftbeaker.